Ep. 53: A Complete Guide to Understanding Elk Wallows
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As a guide and hunter, I've spent thousands of days in the field. This show is about translating my hard-won experiences into tips and tactics that'll get you closer to your ultimate goal, success in the field. I'm Remy Warren. This is Cutting the Distance.

Welcome back, everyone. This week, we're kicking off our elk series, and we're starting with what I'm dubbing Elk Wallows 101. Now, this podcast is going to be everything you need to know for locating and hunting elk wallows. During the rut, during September, one thing comes to mind, and it's just rutting bull elk.

The cool thing about that is there's so many behaviors that you can key in on, and wallowing is one of them. They roll in the mud, they get stinky, they get fired up to gather up their cows, and that's a tactic that you can exploit. So I'm going to talk about how to use them for scouting and how they change throughout the season. But first, I want to share a funny story of when I was guiding a hunter and set him up on a wallow.

This hunt takes place in the mountains of Northern New Mexico in that late September, early October timeframe. Now I really enjoyed hunting this particular area because the elk tended to rut there a little bit later than other places in the country. So I'd be hunting and guiding in Montana and then I could go down to the spot in New Mexico and guide down there and still kind of extend that rut season, get into some awesome elk hunting action. There was a pretty good bull to cow ratio there,

But the area could be very difficult to hunt as well if the elk weren't being vocal or if they weren't rutting well. Because it was just like a lot of timber, a lot of oak brush. Many of the parks and openings were buried in the trees. So there'd be like...

big pine forests around these kind of flatter meadows on the ridges, and you couldn't really glass them from anywhere. So the long range glassing and kind of figuring out where the elk were was difficult because there's so much timber. So you had to, you had to hike around a lot, you had to move around a lot, you had to kind of judge sign and, and find where the elk were. And then if they were vocal, man, that just made it so much easier. But

But, you know, as the rut progressed and got a little bit later in the season, most of the bulls had their cows and they weren't making as much noise or for not as long. So I really had to employ a lot of other tactics just trying to locate where the elk were at.

On this particular week, I had a hunter that he hunted, but he was there with his family. He probably, I would say out of the group of guys, he was the guy that was least into it. Not like the rest of us where we're just consumed with hunting, thinking about it all the time. But you know, as a guide, you're, you're used to that. There might be a couple of people that are there for different reasons.

He was there to enjoy some time with his family and go on a hunt. And me, you know, I'm just 100% hunt, go, hunt, go, go, go, go, go, which is fine. You know, you get used to that. And that's part of the fun of guiding is being able to take out different hunters and everything like that. So, yeah.

I'm taking him out and we're hunting and, you know, we're chasing the elk and trying to get into position. And about midway through the hunt, he's like, Hey man, you know, this is great. You know, we're getting on more elk than anyone else, but he's like, I'm getting pretty tired. Is there any other options? And I'm like, yeah, I've got an idea because earlier that season, a couple of weeks prior, uh,

The bulls were bugling really well and they led us into this big timbered basin. It was like almost like a, I called it the amphitheater. Just the shape of this hill was just, you could hear the bulls in there and they would just be sounding off and it was echoing. And it was just one of those perfect spots to hear and chase elk when you can't get eyes on them. And during the course of chasing a bull in there, I found this perfect wall. It was like the hill came down. It

It flattened out into this one little bench on a point. And for some reason, it somehow collected water right on this flat spot. And it was a perfectly tore up wallow right in the timber. And then it dropped down on both sides. On one side, more pine forest. And then on the other side, it was a pine forest mixed with this big aspens and

ton of trails going right to this wall is the perfect spot. So I just, I, you know, I, I mentally made a note of that. I was like, this is, this is a pretty hot spot. I feel like there was good amounts of elk in there a few weeks earlier. I figured, okay, yep. I'll go set him on that wall the next day. So the next morning I make a plan and I'm like, okay, we actually hunted in there the day before. And I saw the sign that was going in there.

And I could tell like, you know, most of the water in there was pretty clean and this one was still murky. So I'm thinking, okay, the elk were hitting this in the morning. We pretty much just missed them. They weren't making any noise, but definitely a bull was coming in here, hammering this thing and then moved off. Maybe it was a lone bull or whatever. Based on the tracks, I knew for a fact, if we went back in there the next morning and sat it, a bull would come in. So we

make that play. Tomorrow morning, I'm going to set you up. So I cut a bunch of branches down and it was pretty tight in there where you could see the wallow and then it kind of ducked down off both ridges on either side. So about 50 yards away or maybe even closer, I started cutting branches that I could find and built like this really nice blind out of the branches where he'd have a good shot.

And this was actually a rifle season. So plenty close, good opportunity, good lane right there. Just had to stay hidden. I figured, all right, tomorrow I'll just bring in a chair, make it comfortable, and this will be a good spot. So we go back the next morning. I bring one of those folding, like collapsible camp chairs or whatever, carry it all the way in there, get him set up.

And I'm thinking, like, I'm looking around and it's just, it's a little too tight for two people. But I also figured, all right, I'm pretty sure an elk's going to come in here, but I also want to go around on this other side, the more open side, maybe try to glass in there, see if I can see elk. Like they're coming from somewhere and the tracks came from that way the day before. So I'm thinking maybe I can get eyes on this bull. And if he doesn't come to this wallow, maybe I can see where he goes and we can figure it out that way.

So I tell the hunter, I'm like, all right, I'm going to set you here and I'm just going to go a couple of miles around the mountain, get a good vantage of where I'm thinking they're going to come from and see if I can scout that out. But I'm like, I'm pretty positive. I said, if I had to bet money, I would bet that an elk is going to come hit this wallow this morning. And he's like, okay, really? I was like, yeah. I was like, just, I told him, he's like, well, you know, is there anything I should do tips, whatever? And I said, my, my only thing, just do not fall asleep.

I was like, I will be back here at 1130 AM. It's not that long. You know, we're not going to sit here all day. Just don't fall asleep right off the bat. Cause he's, you know, based on the time we came in yesterday, he's probably going to come in around that nine to 1030 in the morning, probably earlier. And, you know, just watch this wall. He's like, okay, cool. And so I walk off and I'm thinking, okay, this is, this is perfect.

I get to my point over on the other side and start glassing in and I see a few cows going through and a good bull. I'm like, oh man, this is awesome. So I'm watching him, watching him and they go and they kind of disappear, but they're taking a trail that leads right to that wallow. I'm like, this is like a for sure deal.

So I'm waiting and I'm like just kind of glassing in there and seeing if anything comes back and like looking and I can see, I'm thinking to myself, man, that bull has to be in there somewhere. I saw the cows kind of come out and then the bull never came back out. So I was like, man, I wonder if that bull just went to wall and the cows came back out to go bed somewhere else. You know, you're sitting there by yourself thinking of all the potential scenarios going on.

But I'm like, well, he clearly didn't go to that wallow. So I'm waiting. And then a while longer, I hear boom, gun goes off. So I'm like, sweet. Okay. Dead bull. This is awesome. So I make my way around to the hunter and I get down to him and he's sitting there and I'm like, okay, where's the bull? He's like, well, he was right here and I shot and I don't know if I'm pretty sure I hit him. And he probably just went over the edge here. He's like, I had to have hit him.

I'm thinking, I'm like, okay. And I'm looking at where he shot at the elk at and where he was sitting. So he's sitting like facing downhill and there's like one good open lane and then the trail that goes to the wallow. And then there's kind of like a trail that goes away from the wallow. And then it drops down into this big thick Valley and just like really thick and nasty down there.

And I'm like, okay. And I'm like, well, just before we go proceed, you know, like, I want to know, like, where'd you hit him? He's like, well, like right behind the shoulder. Okay. So he should just be dead right here. Yeah. And I was like, okay, well, where was the elk standing? Cause I'm looking around. I don't see any blood. He's like, well, he's standing over here and I, and where he's pointing over is like not a real good shot.

And just, I'm trying to figure out, I'm like, I see some tracks. And so I asked him, I'm like, okay, so like what happened? Did the elk just like cruise by? Did he come in? Did he wallow? He's like, no, no. It's just like the elk was just like right there and I shot him. And I'm thinking, I'm like, just the story is not adding up. Because he should have had like an easy close shot. So I was like, so he didn't wallow. The guy's like, no, he didn't wallow.

Okay. So did you have a broadside shot? Yeah. Yeah. I had a broadside shot, but I was like, well, how did you get a broadside shot over here through the trees?

I just couldn't put two and two together. And I started thinking about it and I was like, I don't really care, but I'm just trying to like piece things together. So we, so we know how to proceed. Cause I'm not really finding good evidence. Like if you hit him where you said, then you'd just be right down here. But if you maybe made a bad shot, I don't want to push him. Like I just am trying to build this out. So we don't leave a potentially wounded elk on the mountain or do something wrong.

And so I was like, so he didn't come to the wall. He was here. Was he moving? Well, no, he wasn't. Well, yeah, he was kind of moving. Okay. And so I'm trying to piece this together. And I was like, hey, just so I know, did you fall asleep? He's like, no, I did not fall asleep.

Because I'm looking and I see some tracks and I see like the wallow looks pretty freshly used. I was like, I don't care. But I was like, I just, I'm just trying to figure out the whole story here so I can piece it together. So I can see as I what's going on to make the right move to find this bull. And he's like, no, I did not fall asleep. And I'm like, gosh, it just seemed weird way to stand on a trail for an elk to be broadside there. I'm like, you sure you didn't fall asleep? Yeah, I swear. He's like, I swear to God, I didn't fall asleep.

I was like, okay. So I go and I look and he didn't know, but I had a trail cam set up on that wallow on a tree out of view. And I guess I just forgot to tell him that it was there. So I'm like, oh, okay. So I walk over to the trail camera and I go to review the pictures. And sure enough, the elk had come in. It actually came in, got a drink and then bedded down right next to the wallow.

Then it got up, got another drink, got in the wallow, rolled around, like milled around the thing and then wallowed again. The elk was there for like 10 or 15 minutes, maybe even more, like doing its thing. And then it was like the elk like wallowed again a last time and then got up. And then the last picture I see is like this elk moving. It looked like it was moving pretty quick after that.

So my assumption was he had fallen asleep, would have been there sleeping for a very long time while this elk is like rolling around in the wallow, maybe 45 yards away, doing its thing, like bedded down right next to him. And he was in the blind, must have fallen asleep, woke up, probably scared him to see this elk there. Then the elk saw him, you know, he probably rushed, grabbed his gun, threw his gun up, shot.

And then I started like looking around. I was like, okay, now I understand the picture of what potentially happened. You know, it was like this rush, probably surprised this elk's real close, freaks out, grabs the gun, throws the gun up, shoots. I start looking around and now with that knowledge in mind, I start looking in different places. And sure enough, like right after where I lost the picture, I

of the elk and it looked like it was running. I look and there's like some, a bunch of trees right there. I look closer to where the blind was and I see the bullet hole like in a tree. So the guy had missed the elk, which was good. He just thrown the gun up and shot and hit a tree fairly close to where, you know, I think out of panic, probably wasn't even looking down the scope, but it completely didn't line up with the story I was given. Yeah.

Now, if we're going to talk about wallow hunting, we should first just kind of define what a wallow is. So a wallow, I mean, by definition really is just an area of mud or shallow water where there's a depression that's been made from, you know, large mammals using it over time. A lot of different species use wallows. Water buffaloes use them. You see them out in the flood plains of Australia, Asiatic water buffaloes, or in Africa, a lot of animals use wallows to cool down, to get wet, to get wet.

You know, like even during the summer, bears will use wallows to cool down, to just lay in, to relax and moose. A lot of different animals will use these wallows. Now, the way elk use wallows changes over time. So let's kind of dive into first how elk use wallows because it changes from right now in August through the end of September, beginning of October, that wallow is going to go through some life cycles.

Now, you can think of it like this. You go into the woods and let's say you find a wallow today. You'll know it because it's probably in this round or oval shape. It's in an area that it's holding maybe a few inches of water, kind of got like a silty, muddy bottom. And you look at it and you go, okay, this is definitely somewhere where elk have wallowed. Maybe there's even like some small conifer trees, some small pines that have been ripped up, whatever. And you look at it and you go, okay, this is definitely somewhere where elk have wallowed.

You go, okay, this is definitely a wallow. But at that time of year, that wallow is probably more used as either for cooling down or primarily drinking waterhole water.

The difference between a waterhole and a wallow is what goes on in the water. So a waterhole, you know, you wouldn't call a stream a wallow, even though it's a water source because it's primarily used for drinking. Whereas a small, even like a wallow, other times of year, you'd probably call a waterhole because it's not necessarily used for laying and cooling off, what have you.

Now, what I like to do is, you know, over the course of scouting or whatever, I'll actually put trail cameras or if it's legal on these wallows and see what's coming to them. And for the most part, what you see is you see elk drinking out of them, maybe a few, you know, younger elk, whatever laying in it, maybe some moose laying in it, lots of bears laying in it, and then primarily elk using it to drink.

Now, how's that change over the course of September? Well, what happens is the way bull elk wallow is they use the wallow not as a drinking source or not as cooling off, but as a perfume station. So as the rut starts to progress, as we move from summer into fall,

you know, the elk are going to start gathering up harems. The cows are normally in groups. They could be in large groups, but probably in smaller little groups. And the bulls will start to gather those up and amass more cows in these groups that will create this harem. Now the bulls find these harems oftentimes vocally. So they'll start bugling.

It'll primarily be the smaller, younger bulls that'll bugle first. Then they'll start rounding up cows. Whereas the bigger mature bulls are going to use that, conserve that energy for when that rut kicks off, they're going to go in there and they're going to let the little ones round everything up. And they're just going to go in there and probably take them. But yeah,

Elk also use scents and pheromones to attract cows, to attract mates, to gather harems, to identify their location. They also do things like markings, raking trees. I mean, if you're a whitetail hunter, you'll understand this because you've got your scrapes, which are really just deer, buck, pheromone stations. And bucks set those out as like traps to attract females and they have their kind of routes and they can find females that way. Whereas a bull elk is

its pheromone station is on its body. So the elk will use the wallow to essentially hold its scent, to hold its perfume, to hold its pheromones. So when it's out walking through the woods, the cows can smell it. When it's bugling and trying to assert dominance, the other elk can smell it. It's got its scraper, its pheromone, its male masculine perfume all over it. And the wallow helps hold and disperse that scent.

So as the rut progresses, these waterholes become bull elk wallows by...

elk rolling in them, urinating in them, spreading their scent, and then they'll roll in that mud, and that mud's going to stick to their hair, and then that's going to hold whatever scents and pheromones they're trying to keep on them. So when they're walking through the woods, they're the loudest, stinkiest, nastiest creature they can be, which in turn attracts the ladies. The wallow is the elk's axe body spray, if you can believe it or not.

So once they've got all wallowed up, then they'll go around, they'll do their displays, they'll call, maybe they'll challenge a bull. Maybe

Maybe they've got a harem and their harem's bedded down, they'll walk over, they'll wallow, they'll get all perfumed up to let them know, hey, I'm still here, I'm still the man, I'm in charge of this group. And that's how elk use these wallows during the rut. Now after the rut gets over, you start getting into later fall and those wallows start to clear out, the elk stop using them. Maybe some will use them in arid areas as water sources again.

But during that rut period, during that, I would say beginning of September through maybe the first week of October, those are being used as scent stations for bulls.

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Identifying and finding wallows can be a little tricky because there are certain things you need to look for and they can be kind of pinpointed on a map and some of them you'll just find the best wallows I've found are just ones that you kind of randomly find while you're out there scouting, looking around that are in places mid-mountain, places near bedding areas that you think, man, that's crazy that there's just this little water source right here. But when you really start to analyze it, you can kind of figure out a basis of where these wallows are going to be. So

What makes a perfect wallow is something that has a sandy or muddy bottom, not necessarily sandy, but like a more muddy bottom, silty bottom, shallow, and it's probably going to be in a flat spot where it has less rock because rocky doesn't really hold that silt. It's just not as good.

places that contain wallows regularly would be parks and meadows, like any riparian area. You could even follow streams and around beaver dams or where areas where they flatten out. Another good spot where you find my favorite kind of wall is just like these little pockets. It's just a perfect wallow on the hillside.

It's generally off the side of a catchment or toward the top of, let's say, a basin. So you've got like this basin, maybe where the snow melts going to come down and it forms a creek. So I look off the creeks in any places where the hill starts to flatten out. So up on the hillside above a creek where it might be steep and then you get this sharp flat spot. What that happens to do is the water traveling underground down.

kind of settles there before moving fully down to the creek. It catches it. And those are really good spots as well. So you can look on your topo map. You start looking for riparian areas. I kind of think of wallows in two ways. They're either kind of high or they're low. So in the bottoms of the creeks where maybe it's steep all around and it starts to flatten out, maybe you've got a meadow with a creek going into it. That'll start getting some muddy spots where elk will create these wallows. And then my favorite ones would be, you know, finding...

maybe a river catchment where a stream's coming down, not necessarily a river, but just a mountain stream where there's definitely runoff in the middle. And then looking at the topography lines on your map and while you're out there and finding somewhere where maybe that flattens out up on the hill above or in that same catchment, anywhere where you go from steep to flat to then steep again, you're probably going to find water pooling in those places and elk will utilize that as well as kind of the heads of some of these smaller streams and creeks.

Once you've identified that, you know, when I'm out there, I look for potential wallow spots when I'm scouting a new area. I look for potential wallow spots on my onyx. I start marking potential wallows. Then when I go out there and proof it, you know, finding the exact wallow is a little bit more difficult when you're out there. But then, you know, I'll mark it on the onyx while I'm in the field and just keep those wallows in mind. Now, if I'm doing that earlier, you know,

It's hard to say which one's going to be the wallow during the season because not every waterhole becomes a wallow and not every wallow is a good waterhole earlier in the season. So you have to kind of start marking a bunch of them and then start checking as that September starts to progress, which one's going to be used. Because you might be in one area that'll have 10, 15 little waterholes, springs, other things that could be used as a wallow.

i guess i forgot to mention that identifying springs on the map are really good way to find wall as many of those springs may become wallows as the season progresses so those are also areas that i key on so i'm just looking for potential wallows in the summertime or you know in this august period if you have time and then as the rut starts to kick off i'll go back to those and i'll start checking those wallows again

Really using my nose to identify and looking for ones that look like they've had use. Ones that maybe a lot of them in that area are clear and ones muddy. So that really tells me, okay, something was rolling around in here. You'll start to smell in the heat of the day. Ones that are getting hit and used more will start to reek like elk.

Those are the ones that I key on during the season. If you can place a trail camera there or whatever, that's a great way to just say, okay, is this one being used? How often is it being used? The ones that smell the worst are going to be the ones that are getting hit the hardest. Now I will say understanding wallows is really important to understanding how to hunt them later on.

Once you've identified wallows in an area during the season, during September, you're probably going to see certain things happen. The bigger bulls will start to hit those wallows harder. As the rut progresses, it'll probably be smaller, I would say more immature bulls hitting them real early in the season. And then the bigger bulls really hammering them and taking them over later in the season. So

You know, it could also be a factor of maybe some of those bigger bulls are just going to use them as water holes until they really start to wallow and really get into that act of trying to attract the females. But either way, they can be a really valuable resource on where to pinpoint, locate, and maybe start your hunt from. So now let's get to ways to hunt wallows.

I think of it two ways. You can either ambush on a wallow or you can use an area with lots of wallows to start your approach, to start your hunt, to focus in on a particular area.

Using the ambush method, what I do is I preseason like to scout a lot of different wallows and if it's legal, set up some cameras and understand, okay, what's using these wallows when then as the season progresses, maybe starting the first couple week in September, whatever, I'll recheck those walls and see which ones are getting hit.

Year after year, there's some that always get hit. And then there's some that go dry. There's some that maybe it's a perfect wallow, but they're using one 300 yards down the valley, down the ridge, maybe on the other side of the meadow. That one seems to be getting hit more. I find the one that seems to be getting the most use. And that's where I'll set up either tree stand, ground blind, like a pop-up ground blind, or just a makeshift blind.

If you've got an area where you can use a tree stand, I think that that's probably one of the better options. I've done everything, ground blinds, homemade blinds, tree stands.

Sometimes you're just so far back there and it's just not practical to carry a tree stand. So I generally in that instance go with cutting and making my own ground blind. I mean, a lot of it with elk is just being very still and having the wind right. And those wallows, even if the wind starts to swirl a little bit, the scent from the wallow sometimes overpowers your own scent. This is where I talk about elk hunting and scent control. And in the mountain West, you're not really so concerned about scent control, but if you're gonna be sitting

you know, bringing some kind of scent control spray or whatever isn't a bad option. I don't like to use cover scents because I think it disrupts my nose from smelling things that I need to smell when I'm out there hunting. If I can smell an elk before I see him, that's good. So

If you're going to sit, think of it like whitetail hunting. A lot of the tactics, once you're in that tree sitting are very similar to whitetail hunting. And then at that point, it's just a patient's game. And the key is to try to stay awake and not fall asleep while an elk's rolling around in the meadow in front of you. But that's not always easy to do. So for me, I do a combination of that. I've sat wallows and had a lot of success. I've used wallows a lot, especially for guiding where it's just a more controlled environment where

I wouldn't say that they're guaranteed, but it's very likely that if you put in the time and you find the right wallow, you're going to find success because the elk are coming to you and you may get actually a better opportunity at those bigger mature bulls

especially like peak rut the third week in September to maybe the last week in September, maybe they aren't going to be moving away from those harems as much. So if you can pinpoint that wallow, that's a really good way to target a herd bull. And if that's what you're looking for, that might be your best opportunity to targeting a specific bull in a specific area. There's places that I hunt a lot that trail cameras, you aren't allowed to use during the season.

So what I do to identify wallows then is I try to take a stick or something and I'll place it in the wall and then I'll take a picture on my phone.

and I'll go back and recheck that and see if that area was disturbed. If it was disturbed or there's new mud around, then I know that that wallow is being used. The thing about sitting a wallow is elk can really use them any time of day. They might use them in the middle of the day. Sometimes they're most likely to use them first thing in the morning or before the evening really kicks off. But I also find them using wallows a lot during that midday where

They push the cows to bed. Once that bull gets up from his bed, he'll walk straight to that wallow, wallow around, then go back in the cows and stir them up for a little bit of chase around, a little bit of grab ass, like right before the evening when they start pushing him out again. So

If you decide, hey, I want to sit a wallow, think of it as an all-day investment unless you have proof of when they're using it a lot via trail camera or other intel. Another way to tell if a wallow has been used a lot is just like going in and seeing, okay, what's the water coloration?

Is this normally a clear wallow and it's muddy right now? Well, now I know that an elk has been in here. And understanding that is what I do when I'm just in an area and I decide not to do an ambush tactic, but I use the wallows as a jump off point. So,

I'll just break down one particular area that I hunt a lot. There's a good amount of wallows that, you know, over the years I've done many things with. I've sat them. I've, you know, done this tactic where I go in and I just kind of use those wallows as a start off point. I start off calling into the area and maybe I get a bull going, whatever. Then I'm going to go with that option of calling.

Now, if I don't get that bull to call, maybe they're quiet, but I know I've seen elk in there. Maybe I spotted them before or whatever. It's thicker timber. I'm going to now still hunt to each of those wallows. And I'm going to slowly move into the wallows. I'm going to use some cow calls and other things. I'm going to be glassing and moving slow and anticipating looking around like there's an elk on the wallow and then looking around for...

elk as well. I'll have kind of a route where I've pinpointed multiple wallows on this, what I call my walk or my hunt.

I go to that first wallow, I look, no elk at that wallow, I'm going to analyze the wallow. Was it used today? Is it muddy? Maybe I placed a stick on it or something to decipher whether it's been used. Maybe it could have been used at night. Does it look fresh? Does it smell strong? What are the cues here? Is there an elk around here? If there is, then I can kind of continue to still hunt calls, set up maybe.

If not, then I slowly still hunt to the next one. Doing this, I've found elk, like I've caught elk in the wallows. I've also caught elk in between in these routes and areas around. It's also a good place to start my calling from. It can be a really good tactic as well when...

You know there's elk there, but it's just maybe the conditions got hot and they aren't really making a lot of noise during the day. That doesn't mean that these elk have stopped rutting. You might be figuring out, okay, well, they're hitting a lot of these wallows at night. They're rutting a lot at night. They're being quiet in the daytime, but that still tells me that they're around here somewhere. They're using this as a jump off point and they probably aren't going real far.

It gives me an area to pinpoint where I can still hunt and then I can also set up and do some calling tactics where I'm calling to a quiet bull, where I might be calling to a bull that's cruising between cows. He's using these wallows to perfume up. I can set up and throw out little cow calls, maybe a few bugles and draw him to my location.

even if he doesn't want to bugle back or even if he's not being super responsive. It's also a good way to maybe move through the woods using cow calls. Sometimes you can get those cows to respond to you and identify locations of where the bulls are going to be, even if the bulls aren't being vocal. Just by locating these areas where there's lots of wallows,

understanding that these wallows are being used and then hunting those areas and using that to kind of refine the places that you're searching for elk.

If I were to give you some elk homework for the week, I think what you should start doing, a good use of time. Let's say you don't have any time to scout. If you got an elk hunt plan, start looking in those areas for potential riparian areas, springs, basins where there's creeks coming down, and it could even be side creeks where they flow into main creek. That's where up a little bit higher, look for those topographical lines where it's steep and flattens out. Maybe the top of a little base and there's maybe some

more flat areas and start pinpointing potential wallows. You know, you could use your, whatever your mapping software on X or whatever, and start marking those for when you get into the field. If you have time to scout, check out and start locating, verifying some walls, because it's really going to be a good position to be in, especially during in September, maybe

maybe the elk aren't doing what you want, or maybe you find a big bull in an area and you're like, okay, I can't call him in. How do I pinpoint focus on this animal? Hunting wallows is a huge tactic that you can keep in your back pocket and helps you be successful. So next week, we're going to continue with this elk stuff, bust out your calls. If you got an elk call,

break it out next week. If you don't, well, order one this week. So I'm going to go over, I'm actually going to be, I'm going to try it. Hopefully I don't blow my microphone apart while bugling. I'm going to have to kind of set up a room somehow where it sounds all right and don't get like too blown out or too echoey. My homework is to get a new microphone where I can do this with. I'm

But I'm going to go over bugling and the escalation, how timing to fire up a bull really works because there is much to the sound as there is to the cadence and the timing. And I think you hear a lot of turkey hunters talk about that. Now, one thing I'm going to dispel is elk hunting is not like turkey hunting. When we start to call elk, we are not going to relate it to turkey hunting. Do you guys understand? Was everyone okay with that?

Okay. That's just my rule. So when we talk elk, we're talking elk. We weren't talking turkeys. No talking turkey. Wow. That was just, that was a massive sidetrack to what I really wanted to say. I'm fired up and I'm going to teach you how to fire up those bulls. So until next week, no talking turkey, bust those beagles out. See you later.

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